


Be Careful

by Stayawhile



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-11-22
Updated: 2010-11-22
Packaged: 2017-10-13 08:02:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,099
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/134994
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stayawhile/pseuds/Stayawhile
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Willow turns fifteen, wondering if she'll ever be more than boring, nerdy Willow with the geeky clothes and the 4.0 grade point average.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Be Careful

Three teenagers meandered down a California street, two tall boys and a girl whose hair shone copper-bright in the sunshine. Licking ice cream cones, laughing, and bumping each other casually, their conversation slowed, then stopped as they reached an intersection. “Well, this is where I get off,” the girl said.

Xander, the dark-eyed boy, put his arms around her and pressed their foreheads together for a moment. “And again, happy birthday, Will.”

“Yeah,” Jesse chimed in, “hope you get everything you want.”

Willow laughed. “Thanks, guys. Look, I’m really sorry I can’t invite you tonight, but my mom’s all hopped on the idea of a family dinner. I think she’s been reading some research about how today’s troubled teens are dysfunctional due to a lack of family dinners. Too many microwaved burritos inevitably causing drug abuse and miscellaneous badness. So I’m stuck.”

“No prob, Will. Hey, we had our party already, did the ice cream cone-with–a-candle thing, right?” Xander smiled. “Tell her recent research shows that family dinners can also lead to screaming and dish breakage.” One end of his mouth quirked up. She squeezed his hand quickly, then let it go.

The two boys turned left, and Willow followed them with her eyes as one hand idly played with the singed ends of a lock of red hair. She continued on her way, and let out a sign of resignation as she came within sight of her own house and noticed an unfamiliar bright-yellow convertible in the driveway. Perfect. Even on her birthday, her parents could find a way to both ignore and annoy her. All she’d really wanted was to hang out with Xander and Jesse, maybe see a movie, but her mother had insisted that a family dinner meant just the three of them. But no, now there was company. She’d have to listen to her mother brag about her grades and her PSAT scores and how she’d fixed her father’s computer. Like knowing how to defrag a disk was a big honking deal.

Sure enough, her mother left her in the mostly-unused formal living room and instructed her to “keep Helen company while I finish fixing dinner.” Willow felt sorry for the woman, who seemed fairly pleasant, and had yet to experience the wonder of Sheila Rosenberg’s cooking. As in “I wonder what this was supposed to be.” Not to mention that tuna casserole hadn’t been Willow’s favorite meal since she was six.

Helen turned out to be an academic colleague of her mom’s; she was in town for a meeting at UC Sunnydale. Obediently, Willow sat with her, drank herbal tea and chatted about computers. As they debated the merits of Macintosh technology over the wide range of software available for Windows, Willow found herself feeling less resentful, almost comfortable. Helen wasn’t motherly, exactly; unlike Sheila, she actually listened to what the teenager had to say. Their rapport didn’t last long, however, after Helen took the much-trampled conversational path Willow had learned to dread.

“I can see why your mother’s so proud of you,” she remarked. “She kept talking about how intelligent you are, but of course all parents think their children are brilliant.” Willow thought sadly of Xander’s family, but said nothing as Helen continued. “Sheila said you’re trying to decide between and MD and a PhD in biochemistry?”

“No, she is. She’s got my whole life mapped out for me.” She didn’t know what it was about this woman, but the anger Willow usually suppressed was rising to the surface. “She and Dad have it all figured out. The Impressive Yet Boring Life of Straight-A-Rosenberg. Graduate at the top of my class, then Harvard or maybe MIT, although CalTech would do in a pinch. Then I’m off to graduate school, pass go, collect two hundred dollars, and don’t forget to marry a nice Jewish boy, preferably one who’s already gotten into med school. They have it all scheduled, so I can start having their grandchildren before I hit thirty!” She took a deep breath. “Wow, too much information. Um, sorry. I do babble sometimes.”

“Well, it doesn’t sound like a bad life, and I’m sure they want what’s best for you,” Helen replied. “The question is, what do you want?”

Willow leaned back on the sofa, rearranging the pillows and avoiding Helen’s eyes. “That’s the problem. I don’t know what I want. I’ll probably wind up doing what they expect, just because.” She paused. “Because that’s what Willow Rosenberg does. That’s what I am. Boring, nerdy Willow with the geeky clothes and the 4.0 grade point average. I even went to band camp this summer, even though I’m not really that good a flute player, but hey, it’ll look good on my transcripts.” She sipped at her herbal tea, gazing into it as if divining an unappealing future. “I’m fifteen today, and I can see exactly what the next twenty years of my life look like. About as interesting as watching the grass grow.”

Helen smiled and patted Willow’s leg gently. “Things change,” she said. “You’d be surprised.” She stood up, looking out the picture window at manicured lawns; it was a serene Sunnydale afternoon. “You’re fifteen today, maybe you should think of a birthday wish.”

The teenager mused for a long moment. Her parents’ vision was so clear and fully imagined, it was hard to move beyond it to something that might be purely Willow. A passing cloud obscured the light from the window, and she absentmindedly switched on the lamp. She had almost forgotten Helen was present as the words slipped out.

“Sometimes I imagine… I wish… The way I picture, I would meet someone, and my life would change. I’d see everything in a new way, and I’d learn things that nobody else knows, that most people can’t even imagine… I’d find out I had some kind of power, some real purpose in the world… I don’t know, this is a silly way to put it, but I wish there was magic in my life. That’s what I want.” She laughed, feeling foolish. “I know, I sound ridiculous, it’s that babble thing I do sometimes.”

Gerald Rosenberg’s entry at that moment drowned out Helen’s murmur of response, saving Willow from further embarrassment. Their guest tactfully steered the dinner conversation to her own research, which had something to do with the Russian Revolution, and what really happened in St. Petersburg in 1905. Willow, bored beyond belief, pushed tuna casserole around her plate. Sophomore year was starting in two weeks, and her life would never be anything but predictable.

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally written as a birthday gift for nwhepcat, whose BtVS fiction rocks.


End file.
